Vince Farrell: Vladimir ‘The Impaler’ Putin

But I can't help but react when I see the name Vlad and recall Vlad from 1431-1476, who was one nasty piece of work, as his nickname implies.

That Vlad ruled Romania, then known as Wallachia (aren't you glad to know that), and fought the Ottoman Empire fiercely. His nickname was Dracula. While the evil predilections were different, he was the model for Bram Stoker's horror character, Dracula, made most famous by Bela Legosi in the 1931 often repeated movie.

The modern day Vladimir had a set of eyes our former President, George Bush, looked into and came away saying he could do business with him. The State Department guys didn't bother adding eye-staring contests to the training program. Oil tycoon, Mikhail Khodorkovsky of Yukos, was the 16th richest man in the world in 2004 and looked cross-eyed at Putin and is still in jail - in Siberia. They still do that! Hey, it could have been the original Vlad.

Much worse outcome.

Now Putin and Medvedev are swapping jobs and the farce is totally exposed. Putin said they had decided this a while ago. The State Department had decided a while ago in cables distributed by Wikileaks that Russia was a "virtual mafia state."

Gee, what a surprise.

The thing is 50 percent of Russia's economy is dependent on oil and the oil is dependent on Western technology. BP learned the hard way not to enter a business deal with a state run by the cult of one man's personality. That didn't stop Exxon from inking a deal the other day. But it would make me think twice about Exxon's management.

The US has been trying to reset its relationship with Russia for a long time. Now the reset has to be reset. This is one that you can't blame on the President. This is a brand new mess for international relations and the oil market.

Another mess.

The Chinese have said quite firmly that Europe is on its own and they will not be riding to the rescue. Could anyone seriously have thought so? To take off on a title of a memorable Barton Biggs piece written when he ran Morgan Stanley's asset management business- would a billion Chinese sweat in the sun so the Greeks could retire early? Same for the BRIC's . But there is serious reason to believe Russia is going to have its own troubles soon enough.

The market was full of rumors to start the trading week about the European situation. Forget all the noise. While they are inching closer to acknowledging the gravity of the situation, any major steps will need to be approved by 17 separate countries that share the Euro, and, at best, that will take time.

For what it is worth, I feel a major influx of capital into the banks is needed. Call in a Euro Tarp. At the end of the day, major losses, haircuts if you will, have to be taken on sovereign debt of troubled countries. France, for example, says its banks are fine. Fine for what? They were fine to pass bogus stress tests that did not factor in a Greek default and only marked Greek debt down 21 percent when it is "trading" at discounts of 50-60 percent.

There will be a bunch of votes on a bunch of issues. But I would try to let the noise filter itself out. There is no magic solution and for the market to get excited about rumors to that effect is counter-productive to your health.

I do like we have been bouncing off the 1100-1120 area. Let's hope.

Vincent Farrell, Jr. is chief investment officer at Ticonderoga Securities and a regular contributor to CNBC.